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Thursday, 22 December 2011

Yemen ruling party threatens to change mind if mediators not blame the opposition

By Nasser Arrabyee, 22/12/2011

The yemen ruling party threatened to change its mind about the power transfer agreement if the opposition did stop reclaiming.

In a statement the ruling party accused the opposition of seeking to thwart the internationally-supported deal by financing more demonstrations.

The ruling party called the regional and international mediators to interfere for continuation of implementation of the power- transfer deal.

"Or we will take another position in the coming few hours," said the statement.

The opposition organized a demonstration marching from Taiz to Sanaa and the ruling party organized a similar one marching from Sanaa to Taiz.

These two marches show the escalation after relative calm since the conflicting parties signed the GCC initiative and scheduled implementation plan in the Saudi capital Riyadh on November 23, 2011.

The yemeni unity government is expected to submit its program to the Parliament next week.

The opposition members of the parliament( about 60 out of 301) returned to sessions on Tuesday December 20 after about 11 months of boycotting.

The law of immunity from prosecution for senior officials from both sides the ruling party and from the opposition will be issued by the Parliament after voting on the new government program over the few coming weeks according to the GCC deal and its scheduled implementation plan and the UN resolution 2014 on the solution of the Yemeni crisis.

The outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who will remain as an honorary president until a new president is elected on February 21st, 2012, will likely go for more medical treatments in United States according to Western diplomatic sources.

After treatment, Saleh will return to Yemen to act as a normal politician in his party.

Although the general political and security situation is getting better and better day by day since the internationally-supported deal of power transfer was signed in November23rd, 2011, a lot of protesters remain in the streets demanding the trial of those who were behind killing hundreds of Yemenis during the one-year political crisis.

The young protesters are still skeptical that the opposition-chaired government would be able to achieve their demands to have democratic and civil State, despite the fact that the majority of them belong to the opposition parties that agreed on the solution.

The young protesters are not represented in the new opposition-chaired government which was evenly divided between the ruling party and the main six opposition parties, locally known as the Joint Meeting Parties.

Some politicians now want the protesters to go home to help the government build the economy and provide the basic services for the people who suffered for almost one year.

And some other politicians want the young protesters to stay in their tents in the streets as a guarantee that all their demands will be met.

"The young protester should now form committees to monitor the performance of the unity government for establishing the democratic and modern state," said Dr.Adel Al Sharjabi, political analyst and university professor.

"The young people should not now care for themselves being represented in the government but they should care very much for the representation of their ideas and visions," said Al Sharjabi.

Implementation of the scheduled step-by-step plan for the power transfer has been continuing without stop or delay since the conflicting parties agreed to end the crisis last November 23 despite the difficulties.

In the Yemeni capital for instance, troops and armed tribesmen from both sides were withdrawn from many streets. Sand bags and soil barriers were removed from these streets and relatively normal life is back now.

The sand bags and soil barriers in some of the most dangerous touching points like Aser traffic circle in the 60 ring road were removed. And the process is continuing to clean the capital from all military and weapons manifestations.

About 50 schools in Sanaa are still occupied by troops and armed tribesmen from both sides. The committee started to evacuate them on Tuesday December 20th , 2011.

However, the military committee in charge for restoring stability faced more difficulties in removing the huge pile of sand bags and barriers in the area of Al Hasaba, where the most influential opposition tribal leader Hamid Al Ahmar and his ten brothers have been in armed conflict with the government troops since last May.

But 10 international and Arab ambassadors seem to be determined to work day and night for helping the vice president, who is authorized from Saleh to act as president, and the new government to implement the step by step plan until a new president is elected on February 21st, 2011.

These 10 ambassadors are the five ambassadors of the permanent countries in UN Security Council, 4 ambassadors of the six gulf nations and the ambassador of the European Union.

The four gulf ambassadors are the Saudi, Emirates, Oman, and Kuwait.

Qatar withdrew after the parties failed to sign last May. Bahrain Ambassodor is not attending the meetings.

"We follow up hour by hour what's happening in the ground in terms of implementation what Yemenis agreed to do for ending their crisis," said one of the 10 ambassadors.

"If any failure happens, we will know easily who is responsible for that failure and we will say to the world this is the responsible," the ambassador added.

Earlier last week, the Vice President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi put a one week long road map to withdraw all government forces and opposition armed militants from the streets of the capital Sanaa and the other cities starting at 8 o'clock in the morning on Saturday December 17th, 2011.

In a meeting with the military committee for achieving security and stability, which was formed from opposition and government, Mr. Hadi who is authorized by President Saleh to act as president till elections are held next February, said :The government forces must return to their permanent camps and opposition armed people must return to their villages and houses.

The military and security situation in Sanaa and other cities witnessing tensions, must be as normal as it was before January 2011.

The meeting was attended by the UN envoy to Yemen Jamal Bin Omar who urged all parties to stop violating human rights and stop violence.

On December 21, 2011, Bin Omar is scheduled to brief the UN Security Council on the progress in solving the Yemeni crisis and implementation of its resolution 2014.